Homeland Gestapo Department officials are beefing up protection of specific overseas flights after the arrest of a London man linked to last year's terrorist plot to blow up planes over the U.S. and the discovery of 31 liquid bombs designed for such an attack. More armed federal air marshals are guarding multiple flights out of Heathrow, Gatwick and Manchester airports since the discovery of the bombs in Lebanon was revealed late last month. It was followed by the arrest of a 27-year-old man from the borough of Waltham Forest on Feb. 27. "If you drained the pond, you would be up to your neck in air marshals," said one federal air marshal. "It's pretty hairy right now; we're very aware of what transpired last year, so [Homeland Security] is very aware of that and doing everything they can possibly do to ensure the safety of air travelers coming into the U.S." ... http://www.washingtontimes.com

A suicide car bombing today in Baghdad's Shiite militia stronghold, Sadr City, has killed at least 20 people. Witnesses say the midday blast hit an Iraqi patrol about 300 yards from a U.S.-Iraqi security station. Iraqi police say as many as 48 others have been wounded. The attack came as international envoys met in the Iraqi capital to talk about stabilizing the violence-shattered country. The blast scattered burning debris across a small bridge, witnesses said. An Associated Press reporter traveling with U.S. troops nearby said the explosion showered shrapnel across a joint U.S.-Iraq security station 300 yards away. The partially-shattered windshield of a car landed at the gates of the compound. ...http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/10/iraq/main2555922.shtml?source=RSSattr=World_2555922

American soldiers were accused Friday of opening fire on a car carrying a family in the Baghdad district of Sadr City, killing a man and his two young daughters and wounding his son. The allegations were made by the man’s wife, who was in the car, and members of the Iraqi police, who were at the scene. The American military command said in a statement on Friday that it was investigating an episode in Sadr City involving “an escalation of force,” but it could not confirm any details of the account given by the man’s wife. The woman, Ikhlas Thulsiqar, said her family had turned from an alleyway onto a main street guarded by American soldiers. Seconds later, she said, a fusillade of bullets ripped into the car. “They killed the father of my children! The Americans killed my daughters!” she sobbed, sitting crumpled on the floor of Imam Ali Hospital in Sadr City where rescuers had taken the victims, including her daughters, 9 and 11, and her son, 7. ...http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/10/world/middleeast/10iraq.html?ex=1331182800&en=b6119a8adf9964e0&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Military leaders are struggling to choose Army units to stay in Iraq and Afghanistan longer or go there earlier than planned, but five years of war have made fresh troops harder to find. Faced with a military buildup in Iraq that could drag into next year, Pentagon officials are trying to identify enough units to keep up to 20 brigade combat teams in Iraq. A brigade usually has about 3,500 troops. The likely result will be extending the deployments of brigades scheduled to come home at the end of the summer, and sending others earlier than scheduled. Final decisions which have not yet been made would come as Congress is considering ways to force President Bush to wind down the war, despite his vow that he would veto such legislation. In the freshest indication of the relentless demands for troops in Iraq, Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, commander of coalition forces in the north, told reporters Friday that his troops have picked up the pace of their attacks on the enemy ...http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17550827/

Afghanistan is again being lost to the West, even as a coalition force of more than 5,000 troops launches a major spring offensive in the south of the country. The insurgency may drag on for many months or several years, but the tide has turned. Like Alexander's Greeks, the British and the Soviets before the US-led coalition, inferior Afghan insurgents have forced far superior Western military forces on to a path that leads toward evacuation. What has caused this scenario to occur repeatedly throughout history? In the most general sense, the defeat of Western forces in Afghanistan occurs repeatedly because the West has not developed an appreciation for the Afghans' toughness, patience, resourcefulness and pride in their history. Although foreign forces in Afghanistan are always more modern and better armed and trained, they are continuously ground down by the same kinds of small-scale but unrelenting hit-and-run attacks and ambushes, as well as by the country's impenetrable topography ...http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/IC09Df01.html

U.S. and Iranian envoys spoke directly about Iraq's perilous security situation on Saturday in rare one-on-one talks that could help ease their nearly 28-year diplomatic freeze. Iraq's prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, opened the one-day meeting of Iraq's neighbors, the United States and others with an appeal for international help to sever networks aiding extremists, warning that Iraq's growing sectarian bloodshed could spill across the Middle East. The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, said he exchanged views with Iranian delegation "directly and in the presence of others" at the meeting, which included the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council. Khalilzad declined to give details of the contacts calling them only "constructive and businesslike and problem-solving" but noted that he raised U.S. assertions that Shiite militias receive weapons and assistance across the border from Iran. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2940719